"Because you're a great deal too cruel and ugly," the Queen answered. "What did you knock that poor man down for? I can't bear that sort of wickedness. And as for ugliness, why, you're worse than the Regent himself, and he's the ugliest man I ever saw."
The King immediately became so convulsed with rage that he could only roar till the windows shook out of their frames and shattered on the ground; and the Queen stopped her ears with her fingers, perfectly aghast at the storm she had raised.
At last the King regained his powers of speech. "If you don't marry me this very day," he said, "I'll have you beheaded, I'll have you hanged, I'll have you thrown from the top of the highest tower in the town and smash you to pieces."
"You couldn't do anything of the sort," the Queen said calmly.
Thereupon the King's rage became quite frightful to see, especially for the courtiers who were nearest him, for he rushed among them and began to kick them so that they flew into the air; indeed, it seemed as if the air was full of them. But, in the middle of it, he suddenly made a dash at the Queen, and, before she could avoid him, had seized her in his fearful grasp.
"I'll show you if I can't dash you to pieces," he said, and in a minute he had seized her and rushed out into the open air, carrying her like a kitten.
Up to the little door at the foot of the palace tower he went and kicked it open so violently that it banged against the wall and quivered again with the shock, and then round and round and round, and up and up and up, a little dark winding stair, until a sudden burst of light showed that they were at the top.
"Now I'll show you," he muttered, and, shaking her violently he threw her over the side.
But she only dropped softly a short way, and then hovered up again till she played in the air around the tower.
The astonishment of the King was now even greater than his former rage.